"Public defenders' offices in at least seven states are refusing to take on new cases or have sued to limit them, citing overwhelming workloads that they say undermine the constitutional right to counsel for the poor. ... But now, in the most open revolt by public defenders in memory, many of the government-appointed lawyers say that state budget cuts and rising caseloads have pushed them to the breaking point. ... Over the last three years, the average number of felony cases [in Dade County, FL] handled by each lawyer in a year has climbed to close to 500, from 367, officials said, and caseloads for lawyers assigned to misdemeanor cases have risen to 2,225, from 1,380. ... The Miami-Dade case, which is being closely watched across the country, was appealed by the state, which says that defender offices must share the burden of falling revenues. On Friday, the Florida Supreme Court sent the case to an appellate court for a ruling. If the judge's decision is upheld, it will force courts here to draw lawyers from a smaller state office and contract with private lawyers to represent defendants, at greater expense. ... 'In my opinion, there should be hundreds of such motions or lawsuits,' said Norman Lefstein, a professor at the Indiana University School of Law and an expert on criminal justice. ... 'I think the quality of public defense around the country is absolutely deteriorating,' Mr. Lefstein said, asserting that unless states spent more on lawyers, the courts would force them to delay trials or, as has happened in a few cases, threaten to drop charges against unrepresented defendants. The most immediate impact of the rushed justice, Mr. Lefstein and Mr. [David] Carroll said, is that innocent defendants may feel pressure to plead guilty or may be wrongfully convicted--which means the real offenders would be left untouched. Appeals claiming inadequate defense are very difficult to win, experts says. ... Here in the 11th Judicial Circuit of Florida, the defenders' office has had its budget cut by 12.6 percent in the last two years, said the elected chief defender, Bennett H. Brummer, and the workload has climbed 29 percent over the last four years. ... In Kentucky, the state public advocate, Ed Monahan, filed a lawsuit that would allow defenders to turn down cases they cannot ethically handle. ... In New York City, financing from the state and city for criminal defense declined by $2.7 million this year, from a budget of just over $90 million. Meanwhile, the annual number of cases has climbed to 226,000, from 210,000 in 2006", Erik Eckholm at the NYT, 9 November 2008.
The legal system is breaking down. Consider the implications for muni bonds. End the drug war. Now. The majority of criminal arrests are for drug possession or sale. The US can no longer afford the indulgence of arresting, convicting and incarcerating these people. NYC spends $90 million on indigent defense for 226,000 cases, or $398 per case! At say $500 an hour, my estimate of "NY BigLaw" hourly rates, that's 48 minutes per case. Hey Mary Jo White, I love picking on you, how many hours do you spend a year doing pro bono work for defendants at Rikers Island? Another result of indigents being represented by "public pretenders" as they are called, is many prosecutors are never faced with real defense lawyers and have no clue how to present a case. If you've served on a criminal jury, you won't see prosecutors like those on the 1957-66 Perry Mason show. The cases you see are those which haven't been plea bargained. So they come in unprepared. Why not? They couldn't try the case if they'd want to.
9 comments:
Right IA...
America needs to put down arms in the drug war...
Anonymous:
The Republic survived from 1792 to 1914 without drug laws. If and when Uncle Sam goes into "Chapter 11" like Iceland did recently, he may be forced to stop making war on his own citizens because of a habit they have which he disapproves of. I think had I lived say in San Francisco in 1880, I would have considered the opium smokers strange. So? If you don't like it, don't go into the opium den.
Among other things, our drug war makes the Taliban rich. How stupid.
Taliban rich? Sure...
How about the prison companies?
It's ridiculous that we don't have the funds to do justice properly but have enormous sums to incarcerate...
There will be an increase in crime if we open the prisons... how do we deal with that? It can be managed... but it's real.
IA,
Your analysis is very thoughtful and I read it avidly and comment occasionally.
The tragedy of our Republic is that we are not a Christian nation anymore. There are two ways to preserve a civil and societal order: (1) voluntarily (mostly based on the fear of the Almighty) and the Bible, i.e. God's moral law, (2) involuntary - via the all-knowing, all-powerful, all-controlling State with its bureaucrats, politicians, police and on and on. Yes, in 1880s a 14 year old kid could walk into a drug store and LEGALLY buy opium without a prescription. However, there were virtually no 14 year old kids doing that, because it was IMMORAL. Talk about family values. Therefore, the drug use was confined to very tiny minority of outcasts. Sadly, with the liberal assault against Christianity and the concepts of absolute morality and absolute truth the populace (mostly ignorant of the Bible and the Constitution) chooses to seek the protection of the State. How sad, how tragic...
Anonymous:
What do you advocate? I do not encourage 14-year olds go to the corner drug store, buy hypodermic needles and morphine then inject themselves. So? I don't advocate the Drug Enforcement Agency arrest the druggist and the 14-year old if he chooses to do so.
Murder rates in the US fell after 1933. The US homicide rate was 4.6 per 100,000 in 1910; 9.7 in 1933 and 5.0 in 1944. You pays your money and you takes your choice. If you want to continue our drug laws, look South to Mexico to see America's future. I'd rather repeal the drug laws NOW! As I said before, when the money runs out, we won't be able to afford to incarcerate these people anyway. Your post makes me think of Chuck Baldwin, recent US Presidential candidate on the Constitutional Party ticket. He has a website you might like: Chuck Baldwin Live.
Obscure historical fact: the highest US incidence of opiate addiction was in 1865, right after the Civil War. Why? When a physician didn't know what to do for an injured soldier, he gave him morphine. Addiction rate estimate, about 1 in 200 adults. Imagine, 99.5% of American adults were not addicted to opiates.
IA,
1) My bigger point (and concern) was that our society has lost its ways, because we don't believe in (1) God, (2) free markets, (3) the U.S. Constitution in its original interpretation.
For example, there is an all-out assault against cigarettes which doesn't kill OTHERS; yet there is no all-out assault against alcohol which can kill OTHERS (rape, drunk driving, battery etc.) So, we have (a) cigarettes are bad and unacceptable, (b) alcohol is good and acceptable, (c) drugs are bad and unacceptable. There is no consistent approach.
2) I would go with legalization of drugs. But liberty in choosing drugs (albeit deadly for you) WITHOUT liberty to have private pay for medical expenses creates another dilemma. Mr. X gets an overdose, is transported to the hospital and the taxpayer pay to save his life and/or treat/cure him. Now, what kind of freedom is it? None. In a free world Mr. X is free to use/abuse drugs and if Mr. X is sick or dies, its up to him to pay for his treatment. End of story. It seems to me we will eventually give up on the "War on Drugs" (funny we always wage wars against inanimate objects, instead of human conduct. Our society has lost its moral compass.)
P.S. I know you don't condone a 14 yo going to a drug store and buying drugs. Your example along with mine shows that RESPONSIBLE individuals choose not to abuse drugs. We have a shrinking population of RESPONSIBLE adults.
Anonymous:
We are in partial agreement. As I see the US, it is more and more coming to resemble Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, etc., an oligarchic kleptocracy. I agree, we have no consistent approach to: alcohol, drugs, cigarettes and peanut butter. Peanut butter? Some schools prohibit its sale in the lunch room since some students are allergic. My response: that's crazy. If you ban everything anyone might be allergic to, you can ban: milk, bread, tuna, meat and who knows what else.
I am familar with the "society must pay for the drug addict who overdoses" argument. It is also made to favor motorcyle helmet laws. Should we force obese persons to starve since they have a higher incidence of heart attacks? There are no good answers here.
I have made your point about wars on objects: like say guns. We have a war on terror. What does that mean? In World War II we did not make war on tanks, or Japanese Zeros but Germany and Japan.
I agree "we have a shrinking population of RESPONSIBLE adults". I have said this for decades. One big reason: we bail people out and encourage "moral hazard". Look at Citibank. Instead of a recent $306 billion bailout, we should have directed Vikram Pandit to New York City's bankruptcy court! Goldman Sachs puts its people in at Treasury and when Goldman needs a bailout, who pays? Some 15-year old produces a child and we give her ADC. We worry about "at-risk" kids. 40 years ago, they were unheard of. We encourage illegal aliens to come here for free medical care. Result: bankrupt hospitals in California. As Milton Friedman said many times, "We economists don't know much, but we do know two things. If you want more of something, subsidize it. If you want less of something penalize it". We reward irresponsible behavior, then act surprised that we get more of it. We refuse to make hard choices and tell people you will be responsible for your own actions. As a result, Uncle Sam is effectively bankrupt. When the Chinese, Japanese and our other creditors pull the plug on the dollar, we as a society, will have to come down from "our consumption high" and go on a consumption diet.
It's funny, but you write of our not believing in "God". I say, we have a new God. A new form of redemption. Not through The Law as Jews believe or the Blood of Jesus as Christians believe, but through buying things at the mall. If you buy the right thing, you will be saved. That's what our religious heritage has become, "redemption through consumption". It's sad, but the US is a lost sheep.
IA:
We are probably in total agreement. I believe I mentioned that we are not a Christian nation anymore. And, yes, I am an evangelical Christian, who was born in the former Soviet Union. So I know the hazards of the secular socialism. I ran from it. And our beloved Republic is slowly crawling towards the new SS (Secular Socialism). The peanut butter example is truly remarkable. Our beloved society lost its moral compass.
For the Republic to stand it needs three things: (1) belief in the Almighty Creator of the Bible, (2) free markets, (3) the Constitutional government of our Founders - with very, very, very (did I mention very?) limited powers.
Further, the U.S.A. (as described above) is the ONLY hope for the world, because without us, it will be dominated by Islam (and if its the pure form of literal Koran, its truly militaristic), authoritarian Russia and China, and secular-socialist (without a backbone) former Western Europe. In other words, a place where the rule of the jungle prevails. May God save us all.
Anonymous:
We are in partial agreement. I recognize the dangers of the US 75-year crawl "towards the New SS". FDR, the "savior" of capitalism, and Woodrow Wilson, the would be "savior of the world" initiated the crawl. I part company with you over the need for a "belief in the Almighty". Surprised? Such belief provides little if any GUIDANCE TO ACTION. I'll explain. In 1958 we recited the Pledge of Allegiance daily in school. I noticed something in the classroom. The Pledge as it appeared on a poster in front of the classroom did not have the words "under God" in it. I asked my teacher about this. She said they were added in 1954 and that anyone who wished to recite the pledge without them was free to do so as some belived their insertion violated the First Amendment. Further, that New York City's Board of Education could not spend the money to buy new posters. The class then discussed this change. My comment in 1958, "If President Eisenhower thinks inserting the words 'under God' in the pledge will scare Premier Khruschev, he's crazy. I'm sure many Christians would think, "how dare a seven-year old challenge the judgment of the civil authorities. After all isn't it written that they were put here by God"? I did not surrender my ability to think when I was seven and won't now.
I think Bush is a terrible president. Bush claims to be a Methodist. So?
I agree without US military power, Russia, China and Islam will carve up the world. So what is Uncle Sam doing about this? Fighting an absurd War on Terror. Islam has been at war with Christendom since 711 AD, what doesn't Bush understand?
Another beef with "Christianity" as practised by many today. The illegal alien debate. Many "Christian leaders" say: welcome the stranger. I see another Bible story which is relevant, the Tower of Bable. Who is right? I have no respect for Christian "personalities" who invoke the Bible to support political positions. As far as I'm concerned, they can go to hell. How dare any of them tell me, "Obey the 11th Commandment, thou shalt not think". Let us not forget, many supposed Christian leaders supported Hitler. Martin Niemoller went to prison because he wouldn't.
I can't offer you a more positive outlook on the future.
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